


The Dog Days Are Over

by sirona



Series: PJ Valentine's Collected Works [1]
Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Compliant, Fluff, Kissing, M/M, Nat is the best, PJ Valentine, PJ Valentine's Collected Works, Phil has the best friends, Phil is a hopeless romantic, Phil is quite smitten, Pining, Story within a Story, lighthearted fun, romance writer Phil, srs bsns this is not
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-27
Updated: 2014-02-27
Packaged: 2018-01-13 23:38:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1244602
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sirona/pseuds/sirona
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They say happiness hurts like a bullet in the back, especially when it’s not yours.</p><p>Phil Coulson disagrees.</p><p>Or the one where Phil Coulson is <i>also</i> PJ Valentine, bona fide romance novel writer -- and Clint finds out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Dog Days Are Over

**Author's Note:**

  * For [torakowalski](https://archiveofourown.org/users/torakowalski/gifts), [pollyrepeat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pollyrepeat/gifts), [wintermute](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wintermute/gifts), [17pansies](https://archiveofourown.org/users/17pansies/gifts).



> This is entirely the fault of K and Kris, who incepted me hopelessly, K with beautiful amazing art and Kris with all the plot bunny peddling. :) Hopefully the first fic in a series -- we have Plans. :D The canon divergence tag refers to the fact that I haven't included Agents of SHIELD in this. Maybe it hasn't yet happened. Maybe everyone found out that Phil was alive before he got shipped off. Doesn't really matter.
> 
> Also for Tora and Polly because we are all having a truly horrid week and need some fluffy sweetness in it.
> 
> Thanks a million to Kris for also betaing this. :) Title from Florence + The Machine.

They say happiness hurts like a bullet in the back, especially when it’s not yours.

Phil Coulson disagrees. For one, it’s a horribly petty, selfish thing to say. For another, he believes it’s people who are responsible for other people’s happiness (and misery, but even with everything life has thrown at him, Phil has somehow managed to remain an optimist). Besides, it was Jane Austen, spinster only through her own strength and nobility, who said that if she could not have a happy ending herself, by God, she would give her heroines one. When it comes down to it, Phil knows that he is a hopeless romantic – and he is okay with that. 

He has managed to live his secret life pretty well, considering he willingly and happily surrounds himself with superspies on a daily basis. He never writes at work, but he managed to squirrel away a couple of hours every night to work on _Arrow Through the Heart_ for the past six months, and early response has been promising (even if it is from the only people who know about his writing – Nick Fury and Jasper Sitwell are not prone to exaggeration or lying just to spare his delicate feelings). Phil supposes the time has finally come to look for an agent – or decide to bury the book without a trace. He still hasn’t made up his mind. On the one hand, he likes what’s there. He screwed up his courage and did a squint-through-his-fingers re-read of the first part; and while it could use some serious editing, it wasn’t actually embarrassingly bad. For something that only started life as a way to ground some of his more deplorably unprofessional tendencies, that is (like forgetting to look away as a certain sniper walked past, the smooth skin of his cut arms gleaming under the overhead lights, bow slung affectionately across his broad, muscled chest. And don’t even get Phil started on the spun gold of his hair in the sunlight, because, just, no.

…You see what he means. Clint Barton _can never know_ about Phil’s terrible weakness for his blue, blue eyes and pretty pink mouth.)

Which is the other hand in a nutshell. If Phil is to publish this book, it must be done with the utmost discretion – not least because Agent Phil Coulson of SHIELD could _never_ be exposed as a writer of romance novels. Phil isn’t particularly bothered himself, but it gets so tiresome, schooling young, cocky agents about which way the wind blows. The problem is, it will undoubtedly ruin his reputation as a badass, and he would _hate_ for that to happen. He has grown and nurtured that reputation for years, and throwing all that good work to the wind just seems…wasteful.

It would be easy enough to find himself a pseudonym, however, and while Maria wouldn’t touch the manuscript with a ten-foot pole, her sister happens to be a publisher out of Chicago, and Maria won’t hesitate to let Phil have her contact details. If the manuscript is submitted through an agent, his privacy will be well protected. 

Phil sits back in his chair, looking out of his office window at the beautiful spring day, and broods. He knows that if he were to call Pepper, she would have six cell numbers for him within the hour, just waiting on his call. (Phil is so, so lucky with his friends, and don’t think he doesn’t know it.) She wouldn’t even tell Stark (seriously, _so_ lucky) if he asked her not to. The thing is…

Well, Phil supposes the thing is that he is not exactly a subtle writer. He finds inspiration in daily life – lucky, because his life is far from normal – and does not go to enormous trouble changing it too much from reality. Which means that Carter Bowles, gentleman thief and master archer, breaker of so many hearts he has lost count and purloiner of spoils that would make the Duke of Cambridge jealous, is…not exactly a hundred miles away from one Clint Barton. And the basis for Patrick Cane, middle-aged NYPD detective with a string of never-serious relationships in his past, an ass-chewing boss, a snarky best-friend-partner and an even snarkier little brother, is not much of a mystery, either. Throw in some ‘sizzling sexual tension’ (thanks, Nick, dear God) and a dash of pining and enough snappy one-liners to capsize a forklift, and it wouldn’t take a genius to get suspicious.

Luckily, government agents have little enough spare time on their hands to sleep, let alone read cheesy romance novels that make Phil’s silly heart flutter every time he thinks about his foray into the genre. So it should be fine. Perfectly fine.

\---

Exactly four weeks from the publication date of _Arrow Through the Heart_ , PJ Valentine (yes, yes, you can shut up now, Phil has heard it all and more from three people with tears of laughter streaming down their faces) makes the New York Times’ Bestseller list.

Phil just about has a heart attack.

‘It’s the new Nora Roberts,’ _Romantic Times_ gushes; ‘Watch out, Judith McNaught,’ _Publishers Weekly_ warns. The copies fly off the shelves so fast that a second run has to be pushed forward by three months, and then a third. PJ Valentine becomes a household name. Phil Coulson is suddenly richer than he ever expected to find himself. 

He donates a third of his earnings to LGBTQ rights support groups, marking the donations ‘From Carter and Patrick’. Patrick Cane becomes a gay icon (a little surprising, since if Phil had thought about it, he would have said it would have been Carter, with his gorgeous looks and smart mouth and sweet nature when it came to his friends – Nikita, the cat burglar/art expert, and Walter, his badly-scarred, more-than-slightly psychopathic back-up). 

The first time Phil spots Naomi from HR surreptitiously reading _Arrow_ on her coffee break, half-hidden behind a giant Starbucks take-away cup, Phil has to go put his head between his knees and breathe for ten minutes or so, until he feels less like throwing up.

It’s not that he’s ashamed, because he isn’t. It’s a good book, funny, smart, surprisingly sharp under the lightness, according to Kim, his agent. Apparently, her office is filling up with fanmail so fast she had to buy extra storage. The book resonates with people; whether it’s because of the LGBT characters, the race-gender-age-friendly content, Phil doesn’t know, but it makes no difference. Turns out, PJ Valentine is a hero to a lot of people.

It’s not that Phil is annoyed at the popularity, either. After all, he’d wanted to make people happy. Well, looks like it’s working, with interest. SHIELD has no gender-race-sexuality-based policies – because hello, have you seen its Director and Assistant Director? – and in the coming days, Phil gets to see the cover Huang Chi designed for him over and over, popping up in the cafeteria, the med bay, the waiting rooms for external visitors. 

The problem is that, sooner or later, someone is going to get curious. It’s odds out who will be the first to pick it up, Natasha, Clint, or Tony Stark, but pick it up someone will, and then Phil’s life will be over.

Phil just about resists the urge to smack himself. He’s being ridiculous. They won’t suspect. Why would they? PJ Valentine could be _anyone_. She could be a middle-aged lady writing out of Tennessee. When they see a romance novel, most people assume it was written by a woman, and while it normally makes Phil’s hackles rise for a variety of reasons, right now it’s working in his favour. Honestly, he doesn’t know what he’s worried about.

\---

That little bit of denial lasts right until he looks up one day to see Natasha lounging elegantly in his guest seat, pointedly flipping through a very familiar book.

“’Patrick looked at Bowles, at the white patch of bandage on his forehead, his tired features, and felt something strange and tentative and scary flutter to life in his chest. He should not be here. He shouldn’t be just standing in the doorway, watching the sleeping figure curled up in his bed. He should be calling Miranda, calling Francis, raising the alarm. He should have three patrol cars outside his building right this moment. 

He should most certainly not want to walk closer and run his fingers through Bowles’ blond strands, soothe those weary lines on his face (and when had that happened? Four months ago, all Patrick had been concerned with was catching the cocky, arrogant asshole that was making his department look bad by cutting a swath through the vaults of New York’s socialites, not to mention winding Patrick up with little messages he kept leaving in places he should not have possibly been able to reach.)

This man was dangerous to more than Patrick’s job.’” 

Natasha stops reading and looks up, raising an amused eyebrow. “Oh, Phil,” she says, and Phil feels his entire body flush a horrified scarlet. Oh. Fuck.

Natasha watches him like a cat watches a charming, yet ultimately doomed, mouse. Her lips twitch eloquently, but her eyes are soft where they rest on Phil’s defiant expression. She doesn’t say anything else (she doesn’t really need to), just sits there and looks at Phil, while Phil looks back. He could be saying a dozen things – ‘Don’t tell Barton,’ ‘It was just for fun,’ ‘I didn’t mean for anyone to find out,’ but in the end those would just be useless words that would do no good. Natasha would do what she damn well likes, just like always, and Phil would lose some of her respect for even trying. 

So he doesn’t say anything, and eventually she leaves, with a small but real smile, and “It’s a good story,” thrown softly over her shoulder. Phil puts his head on the small part of his desk not covered in paper and files, and tries to breathe past the lump of mortification in his throat. He wouldn’t put his money on his anonymity lasting much longer, at least amongst SHIELD’s top tier.

Then he pulls himself together, and does his job, because he’s Agent Phil Coulson and he has withstood torture and interrogation techniques aplenty and he’s still here to tell the tale. 

Besides, Barton’s off on a solo mission in Bahrain and _someone_ ’s gotta watch his back when he inevitably pisses off whoever pulled the short straw and landed ‘handler’ on that op.

\---

Someone clears his throat in the doorway to Phil’s office.

As clearings of throats go, this one is eloquent to the point of being chatty. It _wants_ to think it’s being non-committal, but in reality it comes across as too cocksure to be anything other than a desperate bluff to hide what the clearer-of-throat is feeling – definite hints of insecurity and serious doubts that what they’re doing is a good idea.

Phil only knows all this because he has heard this particular sound before, on numerous occasions – and in every single one of those it had been the harbinger of a spectacularly bad, if ultimately successful, idea.

“Barton,” Phil says without looking up. “You’re back.”

The silence is uncharacteristic. Normally, Barton wastes no time in letting him know, in entirely too much detail, exactly how horribly his mission had gone and how terminally bored he’d been during it. Phil looks up; and then he wishes he hadn’t, because the tell-tale orange-and-navy of the book cover peeking from between Barton’s fingers makes his pulse jack-rabbit against his skin.

Barton says, “So, I have a question.”

Phil considers a whole host of actions, up to and including fleeing through the window of his sixth-floor office. But he is Agent Coulson of SHIELD, and thus not a coward, so he merely leans back into his seat and lets his pen drop onto the open file on top of his desk.

“Shoot,” he says, enjoying the miffed look that gets from his erstwhile agent.

Barton raises an eyebrow that Phil eyes with mistrust, knowing as he does that it signals Barton accepting a challenge. He’s right to be cautious, Phil realizes a moment later, when Barton opens the book in his hand with a flourish and clears his throat meaningfully again – ‘Oh, you’re in trouble now,’ it seems to say.

Phil braces himself. He has no idea what Barton is about to bring up, which of Phil’s weaknesses he has decided to taunt Phil with. What he does not expect is what actually comes out of Barton’s mouth – which, in retrospect, is really par for the course.

“’Patrick eyed Carter with well-concealed despair. “Come to taunt me?” he challenged. 

Carter held his gaze; his expression did not change, and that alone told Patrick this was much worse than he had braced himself for.

“I came to say goodbye,” Carter said flatly, and Patrick nodded to himself. Of course he had. The chase was over; Carter had outmaneuvered Patrick, landed himself well in the clear, and now it was time to sever the last thread that remained. Carter could probably feel the boredom creeping up on him with every moment more that he spent with Patrick in the room.

“Of course you did,” Patrick sighed. “Well. Good luck.”

Carter flashed him a hint of teeth from under his top lip. “I won’t need it,” he said, cocky and with a hint of anger, Patrick thought. God, he’d been so stupid. He shouldn’t have let this get so far; he should have backed the hell away the second he’d felt his emotions get involved. But he hadn’t, and this was exactly what he’d known would happen.

He steeled himself to watch Carter disappear, leaving Patrick to his boring little life, routine and uneventful, devoid of handsome daredevil thieves who always stole more than they were offered.’”

Barton stops reading. The silence is jarring after the smooth baritone of his voice, slow and hypnotic; Phil has a stray thought that if the publisher ever wanted to do an audiobook, they should ask Barton to narrate it. 

Then he blinks and refocuses, because he can feel the boring weight of the stare Barton has focused on him digging under his armor, likely seeing far more than Phil would have liked. 

“Your question?” he asks, gratified when his voice betrays nothing of the mess he feels inside.

“My question,” Barton says, kicking the door shut behind him and jamming an arrow between the hinges with a move so shockingly graceful that it has Phil swallowing dryly, “is this. How could you _possibly_ think that Carter would walk away from Patrick? How—Coulson, you almost didn’t write the next three chapters. Tell me I’m wrong. Tell me that you didn’t sit at your laptop and consider letting this book go to the printers without its happy ending.”

How could Clint have known that? Phil stares at him and for the first time in years, he doesn’t know what to say. Clint is right, is the crux. Heartsick and sore, having watched Clint and Natasha head off to bed together after one of the few missions that went FUBAR on her, Phil had wondered whether he shouldn’t just scrap the whole thing, be brutally honest with himself for once.

Clint makes an incoherent noise of frustration in the back of his throat. “You are impossible,” he states, leveling a finger in Phil’s direction. Phil stares at it, bemused, follows it up to the flashing steel of Clint’s eyes and blinks in confusion. 

“I am?” he hazards.

“Yes,” Clint confirms, throwing up his arms. The book flaps sadly in the air, before Clint slams it shut and throws it to land perfectly level on the arm of the sofa in the corner of Phil’s office.

Then he marches over to Phil, rounds his desk, threads his fingers in Phil’s short hair, and kisses the living daylights out of him.

“Uh,” Phil says cleverly once Clint releases his mouth again. “Okay?”

Clint eyes him with unconcealed affection. Phil is aware that his face is probably sporting a ridiculously smitten expression, but can’t bring himself to do anything about that. Clint perches on the edge of his desk, shin nudging Phil’s leg. He looks flushed and very pleased with himself, like he has finally achieved something that has been eluding him for ages. He dips his head shyly when Phil just keeps looking at him, taking time he usually doesn’t allow himself to memorise the precise shade of Clint’s hair in shadow, the way his shoulder melts into his strong, muscled neck. Phil would very much like to kiss that spot, maybe even leave a mark, if Clint would let him.

Wait. He’s getting ahead of himself. He doesn’t even know what this is yet. Frankly, it could be anything at all, when it comes to Clint. (Phil would take anything at all, but he isn’t laying all his cards on the table just yet.)

“So,” Clint starts, kicking his leg lightly, as if he needs to make sure Phil is paying attention. “You kinda like me.”

Phil’s blood, not entirely settled from that incendiary kiss, floods back into his face. He gives Clint a quelling look, but Clint looks too earnest to be yanking his chain. Phil gives in.

“Yes. I kinda like you a lot.”

Clint looks too surprised for Phil’s taste. “Okay,” he says. “I’m not sure why, but okay.” 

Phil eyes him in exasperation, and wonders when the time might be to tell him Carter’s archery is far from the only thing Phil filched off his real-life inspiration. He knows Clint has more self-worth issues than a whole pack of teenagers; but Phil is a patient man. He can work his way through those.

“I’d like to spend some time letting you know, if that would be okay with you,” he says.

Clint looks cautiously thrilled. “Are you asking me to be your…”

Phil waits for Clint to pick a term. Might as well start as he means to go on.

“…Sex monkey?” Clint finishes hopefully.

Phil is not that patient. “The correct term, I believe, is ‘boyfriend’, but I’m flexible on the additional bonus levels.”

“Uh,” says Clint. Phil has never seen him blush this much before. “I guess that would be cool.”

“You _guess_?”

Clint rolls his eyes. “Yes,” he says decisively. It’s got nothing to do with guessing, Phil knows that much. There is a smile lurking in the corner of Clint’s mouth, a sparkle in his eyes that is also new. Phil finds that he likes it really very much.

Of course, this is the exact moment both their phones go, and they have to rush and assemble and kick some supervillain ass (and there will forever be a terrible mark on the inside of Phil’s door hinges in the shape of an arrow being yanked out at speed), but also Phil has never before been kissed upside-down in pouring rain with ops mop-up going on not twenty feet away, and really, these days he is all about new experiences.


End file.
